It was reported yesterday that General HR McMaster, the head of Donald Trump’s National Security Council (NSC) yelled at an Israeli delegation and brushed off its concern that Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed terrorist group, was a serious threat to Israel.
PJ Media reported that in August, an Israeli delegation met with the NSC at the White House to talk about the Hezbollah threat. The meeting preceded a two-week long Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) exercise to prepare for a possible war with Hezbollah in Lebanon. While Hezbollah has been designated a terror group by the US since 1997, McMaster opposes this, and appointed Mustafa Javed Ali, someone opposed to the terror group’s designation, to the position of NSC Senior Director on Counter-Terrorism. As such, the Israeli delegation demanded that Ali leave the meeting.
But the friction didn’t end there. McMaster, after the Israeli demand, allegedly blew off the Israeli concern about Hezbollah, and even went on to yell at the Israeli group.
PJ Media went on to state that none of its sources were aware of Trump’s knowledge of the incident.
Still, none of this should be surprising. McMaster has purged all pro-Israel appointees from the NSC who supported Trump’s campaign agenda. Likewise, as Conservative Review’s Jordan Schachtel wrote last month, officials told Conservative Review that McMaster “constantly refers to the existence of a Palestinian state before 1947,” and that he describes Israel as “illegitimate” and an “occupying power.”
Schachtel also wrote that McMaster referred to the Israeli move to place security cameras on the Temple Mount in July as “just another excuse by the Israelis to repress the Arabs.” Back in May, McMaster also blatantly refused to state that the Western Wall is a part of Israel and didn’t even want Trump to visit the Western Wall on his trip to Israel.
But the anti-Israel voices come from other places, too, such as the State Department, specifically Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
Like McMaster, Tillerson also refused to state that the Western Wall is in Jerusalem, while telling reporters on Air Force One that they were heading to “Tel Aviv, home of Judaism.” He also has stated that settlements in Judea and Samaria were a “challenge” to the peace process.
It gets worse. In July, the State Department released its annual global terrorism report, which blamed Israel for Palestinian terrorism. It virtually looked like the report from the Obama administration’s State Department the year before, devoting more than 3,900 words to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
In turn, Morton Klein, president of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), called on Trump to fire Tillerson, stating that he didn’t expect these types of statements to come out of the Trump administration.
Moreover, the Washington Free Beacon reported last week that the State Department considered demanding Israel give back $75 million that it received from the U.S., but Trump stated that this report was incorrect.
But alas, Tillerson is still employed.
Something must be done to turn President Trump’s agenda into candidate Trump’s. In the last few months, Trump has taken a hard turn Left in many areas, such as immigration and border security. He also hasn’t repealed Obamacare or cut taxes. But while those enormous domestic issues need to be dealt with, foreign policy can’t be forgotten.
The State Department and NSC need to be purged again, and refilled with supporters of Trump’s agenda. Otherwise, Trump will go down as just another D.C. swamp politician, and “Make America Great Again” will be nothing but a bad joke.